Vidal, M., Fornós, J.J., Gómez-Pujol, L., Palmer, M., Pons, G.X., Balaguer, P., 2013. Exploring rock coast bioerosion: rock fragment intestine transit time and erosion rates computation of the gastropod Monodonta articulata (Lamarck, 1822)
Coastal rock bioerosion research is well established. Otherwise there is the need to improve the way in which bioerosion rates are calculated. Since the findings of McLean (1967), it has been assumed that the dry weight of pellets collected after 24 hours provides an estimate of the amount of organism daily erosion. This is an assumption that relies largely on initial experimental procedures lacking any empirical ascertainment. This paper assess what is the transit time of the rock fragments through the intestine of the gastropod Monodonta articulata, and the implications of applicability of this temporal framework to the computation of a more precise estimation of the bioerosion throughout laboratory experiments. Our results suggest that for the gastropod Monodonta articulata, the major part of the eroded and ingested rock is defecated during feeding time. According to this, the confidence of bioerosion rates values calculated by means of faecal pellet collection based on 24-hour time frame can be concluded. Erosion rates for M. articulata activity in limestone rock samples have been estimated to range between 8.00 mg·ind−1·day−1 to 10.10 mg·ind−1·day−1.
